Volunteers pack thousands of Thanksgiving meals for local families in need

SELBYVILLE, Del. – To kick off the season of giving, hundreds of volunteers are packing thousands of Thanksgiving meals for local families in need for Mountaire’s Thanksgiving for Thousands.

“Oh we’re tossing chickens, we’re taking them out of boxes and getting them ready to go into the individual boxes for the families in need for Thanksgiving,” explains one volunteer, Virginia Flood.

One by one hundreds of volunteers from across Delmarva working hard packing over 8,000 boxes with an entire Thanksgiving meal from green beans and brownie mix to a seven pound Mountaire chicken.

“Just today alone we will have over 85,000 items that will go out to the community itself,” explains Roger Marino of Mountaire.

It’s all a part of Mountaire’s Thanksgiving for Thousands event. It’s an event they’ve been doing for over two decades, one that’s put on by the community for the community.

“When I started it 24 years ago we did 300 boxes and nobody complained about needing more today we will do this with 8,500 hundred boxes,” explains Marino.

That means nearly 42,000 people will get a Thanksgiving dinner this year, families that might not have had one otherwise. That’s why it means so much for those that made their way to Mountaire’s warehouse Monday to help out.

“It’s kind of nice because I’m on a fixed income and I can’t give money and so I give my time,” adds Flood.

Another volunteer Horace Maloney says, “Oh it’s great. I mean it’s great to participate in the community to be able to help and to be able to go home and say ‘hey guys I helped do this see this.”

It’s an event that brings smiles to everyone’s faces, some holiday cheer and a whole lot of community pride.

“To see all the community support and the hundreds of volunteers that are out and just the camaraderie we all have and how efficient everything is and how smooth everything runs with the lines. And just to see all the help in this area shows how strong the community support is on the Delmarva peninsula, so it’s awesome it really is,” adds Eric Sichau, another volunteer from the Delmarva Shorebirds.

Local churches are taking these filled boxes and distributing them to needy families in their area on Tuesday before Thanksgiving.